Pihkal

by Alexander Shulgin

  I didn't dare question the authenticity of the emotions being expressed. I could question their durability all I wanted, but what I was reading in Ursula's letters often had an intensity and unmistakable yearning that seared the page - and me.

  Then came the letter that changed everything.

  It was a Saturday afternoon. Shura came into the living room where I was curled up on the couch with a book, and silently handed me a letter which had just arrived. Glancing up, I saw his face clouded. I turned my attention to Ursula's spiky German public school handwriting, which was still hard for me to decipher.

  After addressing Shura as her love, her soul-mate and other variations on the theme, she described in detail a trip to the ancient city of Nuremberg, with Dolph and two close friends.

  They had gone there for the four days of Richard Wagner's Ring Cycle, and there was no mistaking the excitement and delight she had felt during the experience.

  I thought it was one of her most enjoyable letters. She told about the dress she wore on opening night, "As I stood before the mirror, I could feel you, my darling, watching me and smiling. I heard your voice telling me I was beautiful in the flowing white silk, the silver shoes and handbag, the embroidered scarf. You were so proud of me, my beloved!"

  She went on to convey the magnificence of the theater, the deep blue of the velvet curtains, the superb stage lighting and scenery. She spoke of herself, in her red plush seat, creating in her imagination the figure of Shura sitting next to her, his hand enfolding hers as the magnificent music of Wagner carried their souls upward together.

  She either doesn't know or she's forgotten how much he loathes Wagner.

  There followed descriptions of some others in the audience, delightfully catty examinations of bad taste as expressed in various hair arrangements, jewelry and clothes.

  The only mention of Dolph was in relation to one of the singers, "Dolph and our friend Rudi agreed that this man's voice did not meet the expectations raised by the rest of the divine company. Surely, they will not give to him such an important role next year!"

  Then she spoke of the strain she felt, trying to maintain the necessary lightness of conversation with her companions, while thinking privately of what was to come: "Oh, soon now, very soon, my twin, my other Self, we will be together and none shall part us. Thank you for being so patient, for giving me the time I must have to calm the storms within the heart of poor Dolph, so that I can break free, soaring like the music, to join you forever."

  Shura was sitting in the armchair, waiting for me to finish the letter. When I put it down, he asked, "Well, what do you think?"

  What, exactly, has made him so angry?

  "You have to remember," I said, cautiously, "I don't read these things with your eyes. What are you reacting to?"

  "Doesn't it strike you," he said, voice tight, "That she has given a great description of a delightful trip, an interlude of several days with Dolph and friends, to see the Ring Cycle, and that not a word of this sounds like a woman agonizing over her husband's suicidal or other-cidal depressions? I don't see anything in that letter to indicate that Dolph wasn't having a fine time, along with the rest of them, do you?"

  "Well, she wasn't going into details about Dolph, honey. It was a letter about the trip and the theater -"

  He interrupted, hitting the arm of the chair with his fist, "Am I going mad, or is this what you would do if you were trying to wean your husband away from you, trying to get him to accept the end of the marriage? She sends her books across the ocean, then she takes off with the husband she's about to leave at any moment, and a couple of friends, and they all go to see the bloody Ring Cycle in old Nuremberg!"

  I'm missing something. It didn't seem that strange to me.

  "Oh, I don't know, I don't know!" Shura pounded his forehead, "It just seemed so - so crazy, all of a sudden. All that fun and games at the opera, while Dolph is supposedly suffering the pangs of betrayal and Ursula is nursing him, easing him into accepting her imminent departure - all that tension and misery - then this! It just struck such an incredibly wrong note!"

  I thought for a moment, remembering the combination of obvious delight with the sad, wistful longing to have Shura beside her.

  Be as objective as you can.

  I spoke slowly, carefully/ "Well, it seems quite possible to me that she might simply be keeping peace this way, and perhaps things were getting too - well, you know - too closed in, too tense at home. Maybe she thought it would lighten everyone's mood if they just took off and went to the Ring Cycle. She talks of missing you, wishing you were there."

  "Yes," Shura nodded, "Almost as if she were remembering every now and then to say the sweet words, to make sure I don't think she's really enjoying herself. But she was enjoying herself. I can read it in every line. It's just not -1 can't fit it into the picture. Nothing fits the picture properly. None of it makes sense."

  Ursula goofed. What now?

  An idea came to mind as I looked at Shura's lion head, bent onto his hands. I tuned into his hollow fear that this state of affairs would go on forever, that there would never be a true resolution, and the deeper suspicion that he was being played like a puppet, for unknown and unknowable reasons.

  I said, "I just thought of something I might do, my love. I think it's time you jolted the lovely lady a little, and I have an idea of how to do it. I'm going to write a letter to her."

  "What?" Shura looked up at me, his face totally uncomprehending.

  "Let me work on it, okay? I'll give it to you, of course, and it'll be entirely up to you whether it gets mailed or not. But if it is sent, it must seem as if I'm doing it entirely on my own. You don't want her to suspect that you have any knowledge of it at all, otherwise it'll look like exactly what it is: a ploy. A prod. Just wait and see what I come up with."

  Shura shrugged, "I don't know. If you want to try it, I can't stop you, but - what the hell would you say?"

  "I'll put it in your hot liddle hands when it's done. No use rehearsing it now. It'll take me a couple of days, then let's see what you think." It was the strangest letter I'd ever written. The words were from my heart and gut/ and by the time I'd reworked it four times, I was able to call it a masterpiece (at least to myself), even though I knew that Shura - if he decided it could be sent - would be using it only to make the woman he loved jealous and insecure and perhaps inclined to move a bit faster in tying up her loose ends My reason for writing it was not complicated. In case Ben was right, after all, this might well give her the excuse she needed to break things off with Shura. It would, in other words, take her off the hook. If, on the other hand, she really wanted him, wanted to come and stay happily forever after on the Farm but was dragging her feet for innumerable reasons, this would almost certainly give her a kick where she needed it. Even if she were to find out, later, that it wasn't going to be forever after, things would have been moved along a bit toward whatever the conclusion was going to be. At this point, I thought, anything that speeds this whole business up is all to the good; Shura is getting too depressed. It has to be resolved.

  Ursula,

  I am taking the liberty of writing to you directly, without the knowledge of Shura, because I think you should know what the situation is and because he is suffering greatly from what he reads in your letters - or, rather, what he does not read.

  I have been in love with Shura since the Fall of last year, when I first met him. We allowed ourselves to become involved during the past many months, because of our mutual loneliness and need for companionship of a kind that is hard to find for intelligent people with unusual interests such as ours.

  He has told me from the first time we met of his love for you. He has never failed to mention you, to talk of you, as the woman he loves and wishes to live with for the rest of his life, and it was in full knowledge of all this that I decided to continue my relationship with him, a relationship which must end, of course, when you finally come to be with him, to live with him and make t
his place your home.

  What I am attempting to do, in writing this, is to tell you that I believe this man is worth the pain I feel in knowing that I cannot have his heart, and the pain it will be for me to relinquish the closeness and the extraordinary communication of ideas and concepts. I could have saved myself all this pain, both past and future, if I had decided not to become involved in his life.

  But I decided otherwise. For the first time in my life (and most certainly the last), I let myself be part of a triangle - I allowed myself to love a man who loves someone else. I am older than you, Ursula, but I am still a woman of some attractiveness and certainly of great pride, so this was not an easy decision.

  I wish you to know that I can see him go to you without jealousy or hostility, when you come to join him, because I love him enough to want to see him fulfilled. He believes - and since he does, I must - that you are the one person in the world who can make him truly and deeply happy. Since this is so, I can only hope and pray that your love for him is, and will continue to be, the equal of his for you. If it is, I will be - in time - content and even satisfied.

  Please know that he is suffering right now from many doubts and a lot of emotional distress.

  You might perhaps realize that he needs to have some definite encouragement from you as to the fact that things really are moving and evolving in your effort to leave your marriage and your country. He is becoming deeply discouraged, and I write to you asking you to please do or say something which will be reassuring to him at this time.

  I believe it was inevitable that you would learn of my relationship with Shura, since he will want to tell you the truth. We have established our strange, difficult and caring relationship on the basis of absolute truth-telling, playing no games of half-truths with each other, and I know that he will insist on total honesty and openness in his future life with you. I feel that, once you have recovered from the surprise and shock of discovering that someone else shares many of the same feelings about Shura and has had some closeness to him, you will welcome what I have to say:

  he is in love only with you.

  It is one thing to hear from Shura that he made at all times clear to me that you are his one and true and only love; it is even better to hear it from the "other woman." And from me you have heard it. He is yours, lady, his heart and soul belong to you. All I ask is that you treasure them as I would if they had been given to me.

  There is no need for a reply. I hope to someday be your friend, but that will be entirely up to you.

  Blessings, Alice Parr

  I wrote my return address clearly on the envelope, addressed it by hand, and brought it with me the next Friday evening when I drove to the Farm. I sat in Shura's office on a stool while he read the letter, and in my mind I reworded the message it contained.

  All right, you who are loved by the man I want to be with for the rest of my life; if you truly are what he sees and believes you to be, you deserve to be the uncontested owner of the territory, and I'll have to resign myself to being Graceful looser. But if by any chance you're playing some kind of game, Pretty-pie, I'll be around to pick up the pieces. Not only that; if you do stay here and I have reason to believe you don't really love him, I'll do everything I can to fight you for him!

  When Shura had finished reading, I said, "I'm just going to leave the whole thing in your hands. You mail it or not, as you wish. It's got to be your decision, because there's no way to know how she'll react to something like this, and if it backfires, I have no intention of being held responsible."

  He nodded and folded the letter into its envelope.

  He's been forced to look at what I feel for him on paper, look it full in the face. No hiding from those words. Doesn't hurt to remind him, yes.

  The next morning, Shura said, "There's a new family of compounds David and I have developed, called the 2C-T's. So far, we've completed the synthesis of 2C-T-2, 2C-T-4 and 2C-T-7, and I've taken the "T-2" up to active level."

  I murmured, "Uh-huh - ?"

  "Quite interesting. Thought you might like to try it with me today?"

  "I'd love to," I grinned.

  "Just to make sure you're fully informed and will identify the drug properly in your notes," he glared meaningfully at me, as I nodded very hard to indicate that I would, absolutely, write a report, "Its full name is two five dimethoxy, four ethylthiophenethylamine hydrochloride."

  "Thanks. I needed that. What level?"

  "Well, I took it up to fifteen milligrams and got a plus-two, so I thought we might venture another step, to 18, and see if we can get a plus-three out of it."

  The telephone rang. It was an attorney who wanted him to testify in court as an expert witness for the defense in a case involving Psilocybe mushrooms. Then there was another call, a reporter in San Jose, who needed information about MDA. Shura went through his usual, "I'll be glad to give you any and all information I have available, but not for attribution. I don't want my name mentioned in the paper," and I sat there, chuckling at his silent pantomime of the usual protests and arguments from the other end of the phone.

  Shura had explained to me that he preferred to keep what he called a low profile, that there was no benefit to him in having his name casually publicized, and that if the reporters or journalists were sincere about wanting information, they would accept his condition. They always argued, he said, but in the end they usually agreed to do it his way.

  I filled the bathtub and took my bath. When I emerged, Shura was on the phone again, winding up another conversation as I entered his office. He said, "That was an old friend, Terry Major. He used to be part of my experimental group way back in the days when Sam Golding was involved. Terry and Paula - that's his wife - were with Helen and me and the Closes the day Helen took the plunge into mescaline."

  "Oh, yes," I said, "The jeweled snakeskin."

  "They're among my oldest friends, and we used to do a lot of exploring together. Not as much, the last few years. Terry's a psychologist at the university, and the rest of the time, he and Paula raise mushrooms - the eat-with-your-steak kind, non-psychedelic - and write books about their care and feeding. Good people. You'll meet them someday. Dolph and Ursula became good friends with them, when they were over here from Germany."

  Got to get his mind off Ursula and Dolph and Germany.

  I sat down and informed him, "I'm ready for the whatsis."

  "2C-T-2. That's the 2-carbon analogue, the phenethylamine analogue, of Aleph-2. The T

  stands for thio, which is a chemist's way of saying you've replaced an oxygen atom with a sulfur atom."

  "Oh," I said, "And what's the two for?"

  "Which two?"

  How many blasted two's are there? Oh, yes.

  "The second two."

  "It's there because Aleph-2 is the second Aleph compound I made."

  "Oh. That explains it," I said brightly, "Thank you very much."

  Shura gave me his smart-ass grin and got up. "I'll weigh it out, then."

  "I've had my bath, so you can use the water for your shower."

  "Let's take our Experimental Substance first. It takes between one and two hours to plateau, so there'll be plenty of time for a shower."

  "How long does the whole thing last?"

  "Between six to eight hours, if you're me. Going by past experience, you'll probably make it last ten or twelve!"

  I laughed. "Okay," I said, "Ingestion of Experimental Substance first, then."

  As we clinked our glasses in the kitchen, Shura looked at the clock above the sink and noted, "Two o'clock, give or take," and we drank, toasting ourselves and the lovely warm Saturday.

  I curled up on the blue couch and looked through some art books I had stacked on the coffee table earlier. The paintings involved me sufficiently so that I forgot about having taken the 2C-T-2 until reminded by my own alert - a flush of goose bumps up my spine. My watch said 2:35

  PM.

  I got up and turned on the television. The Discovery channel
, one of my favorites, was showing a documentary on Nepal. I watched it with deepening interest until its conclusion. It was 3:00 o'clock and I was definitely plus-one and climbing. I sat down at Shura's typewriter, which I had borrowed again, near the big windows, and began my report with dosage level, date, time of ingestion, and the remark that so far, at over a plus-one, it seemed okay.

  Shura came in and asked how I was doing. I said fine, that I was climbing slowly, and asked him, "Where are you?" He said, "A pretty firm plus-two. You?" "Not quite a two." "You want to be alone for a while yet?"

  I said yes, thank you, and told him I was writing my report like a good girl. He said, "Will wonders never cease!" and left.

  During the next half hour, I became aware of a slight body-load, a sense of strong energy beginning to be felt; at first it was only around the shoulder-blades, but soon spread throughout the rest of me. My tummy asked questions, but there was no nausea, only alertness. Feeling slightly restless, I went outside and turned on the hose to water Shura's new rose bushes, which had been planted by Theo in the early spring. The two cats - Male and Ms -

  ran up to me and nuzzled my legs passionately. They were usually friendly, but a human in an altered state affected them like catnip. I bent down and stroked them.

  A little while later, Shura and I closed the bedroom door to keep out the sound of the telephone, and sat on the bed, cross-legged, facing each other.

  "How is it for you, so far?"

  "So far, it's fine," I said, "During the transition part, I had a few moments of wondering if my stomach was going to be all right, but that smoothed out. The energy tremor is very strong, but I'm getting used to it, and I think I'm going to like your Two-something." "What level would you say/ at this point?" "Oh, plus-three, absolutely."